Chapter 37
Clarence died at three o’clock that morning. We were dozing, or pretending to, when the machines went haywire. Mrs. Smythewhite folded herself across Clarence’s body as if she could force his soul back inside it, her keening stifled by fabric. There at the end, pity warred with my relief.
Later, while we waited for her cab and Luke’s arrival, she thanked me. “If you need anything,” she finished, “I’m here for you.”
The words cut deep into my gut. This was my fault, every inch of it proof of my fallibility.
If I’d realized what was going on from the beginning, could Clarence have been rehabilitated? Could I have returned the pelt to Bastion in a more gradual manner that wouldn’t have drained away the last of the teenager’s health without reinvigorating the cousin I loved?
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